- NEWS
- SPORTS
- Lakers rout Thunder 2 hours & 55 minutes ago
- O.C. football: Updated playoff brackets
- USC at a crossroads 2 hours & 2 minutes ago
- Bruins have their sights set on victory 1 hour & 55 minutes ago
- BUSINESS
- ENTERTAINMENT
- LIFE
- TRAVEL
- OPINION
Angels should inquire about Young
January 12th, 2009, 8:23 am · 16 Comments · posted by Earl Bloom, staff writer
Mark Teixeira is on his third team since leaving the Rangers, but he still has an impact in Texas.
All-Star shortstop Michael Young has asked Texas to trade him rather than shift positions (again) and move to third base to make room for prospect Elvis Andrus, 20, obtained from Atlanta in the 2007 Teixeira trade.
Young, who won his first Gold Glove in 2008, moved from second base to shortstop in 2004 after the Rangers traded Alex Rodriguez to the Yankees.
I don’t know if this is one of those opportunities that might present itself which Angels GM Tony Reagins refers to, but the club in Anaheim should probably contact its AL West rival. I am sure the price will be very high, and it should be.
Young, 32, is a five-time All-Star with a career .300 average and 652 RBIs in eight seasons.I have never seen Andrus play, so maybe there is an obvious answer why the Rangers don’t have the rookie break in at third base instead of angering the franchise’s best player.
Otherwise, I see no reason why the veteran should have to move to make way for an apprentice still learning his craft. Very few shortstops can’t play third base; if the Rangers think Young can do it, why not the youngster? It is just another in a long line of backwards thinking in baseball recently.
There is cost certainty with Young. The 2009 season will be the first year of a five-year, $80 million extension he signed with the Rangers in 2007, when he still had two years left on a contract. At $16 million a year he is an expensive piece, but his production has been outstanding. And, for a new team, he might even change positions.
To save some the trouble of pointing out Young had his worst offensive season in the past six last year, I already noticed. Young played the final two months with a fractured ring finger on his right hand. He also made just 11 errors. Andrus made 32 in Double-A.
Check out Sam Miller’s take on Michael Young.
Other baseball posts:
16 Comments
Leave a Reply
-
ADVERTISEMENT
-
ADVERTISEMENT
[...] in Arlington, Texas. The second guy is Michael Young everywhere else. If your team were to trade for Michael Young, then, which shortstop should you [...]
That’s a great post on Three Days of Cryin’ regarding Young’s home/road breakdown. My answer would be both guys. The uniform thing wouldn’t be any big deal since the Angels wear their nickname on both, apparently because Los Angeles of Anaheim doesn’t fit.
This was my first thought, when I heard he was seeking a trade. The big problem here is we can’t give up too much young talent to get him. I don’t see Texas giving him up cheep.
Lets go Tony, pull the trigger, trade Aybar, Weaver & Willits. Michael Young would be a great addition, we need his bat and leadership. I would love to have him up when you need a clutch hit or a bunt!!!!!!
Trade Howie Kendrick !
No. We have plenty of infielders, in fact we should be trying hard to trade Figgens (even though his face is plastered all over Angel Stadium). Let us finally find out what Wood-Rodriquez-Aybar-Izturis-Kendrick et al. can do….
No to Mike Young. Let Wood play!
trade within the division? not likely. dont do it. sign oliver perez.
Let me get this straight. He’s about to get paid $16 million per year for next five years and he’s unhappy about playing 3B? Wow!!! I don’t think he would fit in here with that attitude.
Third base is a completely different position to learn. It’s not about money. It’s about confidence and wanting to come to work. He knows he could possible go from an All-Star short-stop to a below average 3rd baseman. He’s a proven hitting machine and top tier player. Realize all of the younger Angels may not acheive that. He’d be a huge asset to the Angels.
Hey Earl,
Your post is a clear example of why no one who knows anything about baseball takes sportswriters seriously. Michael Young might have a career .300 avg, but his OPS has been steadily declining–ending at a paltry .741, which is close to Figgins’ career OPS of .743.
In other words, the guy has no pop left in his bat, and you want to commit to that for the next 5 years at 16 million per? With the end of the steroid era, no one in his mid-30’s is going to show great production.
Also, the Angels’ biggest problem is not getting power from the corner infield positions. I am hoping Morales is going to develop into an above-average guy, but 3B is really lacking. If we are going to trade young talent, I see Garret Atkins of Colorado being the best bet.
What does it take to be a sportswriter these days? Apparently not much knowledge.
Hey Chris
Your post is a clear example of a reader not reading the post, and jumping to a conclusion.
Please show me where I wrote that the Angels should commit to anything.
I said the Angels should inquire about Young, see what the price is, etc. Kick the tires. I never said they should commit to a deal.
If you think the current Angels infield has four players who are better than Young, fine. We can agree to disagree on that. Three of the projected starters, however, are young players who should still be on the upswing. I totally understand that. I am on board with giving Kendry Morales a full shot.
It seemed to me the Rangers painted themselves into a corner and until Young said yes to the move to 3B they had a real problem on their hands. They might’ve had to eat some of his salary in any deal.
I like your Atkins at 3B idea, but when I suggested the Angels might be able to make a fit with Colorado, other readers dismissed me in terms similar to yours.
I really don’t understand all the personal insults directed by readers on this site.
For your information I have been a sportswriter since 1972. I first came to the Orange County Register in 1977.
Look forward to hearing from you again.
While I agree that personal insults are uncalled for in a forum like this, I think the resistence alot of your readers show is because of the dismissive nature in which yourself and Mark Whicker respond to any modern analysis, while constantly playing the “I’ve been covering sports since before you were a twinkle in your mommie’s eye” card to try and put us “stat-geek” types in our place.
I love the different perspectives we get on this blog, and really do appreciate the years some of you have put into your craft. I’m sure you’re aware, however, that even though we don’t do this for a living, lots of us live and breathe this game. We watch it on tv, listen on the radio, and yes, read about it on the internet. The work people put into to organizing and studying all the statistical data that gets left on a baseball field should not be dismissed simply because they never played the game past little league or hung out in major league clubhouses. New information is a good thing. Its purpose is not to discredit the work that writers and reporters such as yourself have put in, but to act as a compliment and give us, the readers, as much to chew on as possible.
Earl,
I apologize for the rant. It was not necessary. It just seemed ludicrous to me that you would suggest even looking at Young. For his price tag, he is a terrible value. He had two good years in ‘04 and ‘05. He’s basically getting “name” money at this point.
Looking again at Atkins, his home/away splits suggest he’s not that good either. Hopefully, Wood will develop, but in my opinion, he’s got a long swing with a lot of holes. I would try to trade him.
The biggest problem, I think, is Mickey Hatcher and/or the Angels’ hitting philosophy. I love Scioscia and his aggressive brand of baseball, but there are too many hackers in the lineup. On the ‘02 championship team, there were a lot of free swingers, but the lineup was sprinkled with players who could take a pitch and work the count, such as Glaus, Eckstein, Spezio. The current team has no one who walks, except for Napoli and maybe Figgins.
Kotchman came up with a reputation for a good eye. He could have developed into a near-.400 OBP guy, but it seems to me the Angels ruined him by encouraging a free-swinging approach. I laughed when I heard Hatcher taking young guys like Kendrick aside when Texeira was batting to show how Texeira worked the count. Well, Texeira had no influence from Angels’ hitting instructors, that’s for sure.
I hate to suggest anyone should lose their job, but Hatcher is not a good hitting coach. The Angels should give him another job, but not that one. I am sick of seeing good pitching in the playoffs mow through the lineup with minimal effort because Angels’ hitters are predictably swinging at a high fastball or a breaking pitch away in the dirt.
Finally, the beauty of baseball is that a lot can be ascertained by stats. Oldtimers like you and Joe Morgan feel threatened by sabermetrics, but the fact is that a stats like OPS and WHIP are much better indicators of effective performance than batting average and wins. These types of stats enhance understanding of the game, not take away from it. Who are two of the best GM’s in the game? Theo Epstein and Billy Beane. Who drafted a lot of the young talent on the Dodgers? DePodesta.
You don’t have to agree, but you should have a more open mind.
Chris: Apology accepted … conditionally.
Joe Morgan is 10 years older than me. I am eight years older than President Obama. If that makes me an oldtimer, so be it. I guess there always has to be a dig in there someplace.
However, I would like to know where you can claim I feel ‘threatened’ by sabermetrics? I have been drafting fantasy baseball pitching staffs based on WHIP for a long time. I feel all baseball statistics are wonderful and should be examined, thoroughly. Actual victories should count, too, since that’s the point of the game. Others prefer hypothetical victories. So be it.
But all conclusions can not be reached simply by statistics alone. That I have a problem with.
I have known Billy Beane for a long time, since his days as an advance scout. I admire much of his work, but I am not going to sign off on his theories until HE wins a World Series, OK?
If Moneyball means trading away your three best starting pitchers when you’re three games out of first place, then it doesn’t work very well. The A’s basically forfeited the division to the Angels last year.
I have read in recent days on this blog that the Angels lose in the playoffs because of Mike Scioscia, and other such gems. Sorry I don’t have an open mind on such things. On others, yes …
Earl,
First of all, Beane works with a small-market budget. The reason why he traded all those guys at the time was because, although they were three games out, their long-term prospects didn’t look good. Those pitchers were going to leave in free-agency, and the A’s weren’t really championship caliber as constituted at the time.
Secondly, it’s ridiculous to say that you are not going to “sign off on his theories until HE wins a World Series.” The fact that the A’s were one of the best teams in baseball when they had the Big 3 and Giambi and Tejada, et al., in spite of their limited budget, shows how well the team was drafted and built. Beane is not out on the field. The A’s PLAYERS choked, and they were going against some good Yankees squads. See what Beane would do with Reagins’ budget.
Finally, in support of you, the Angels don’t lose in the playoffs because of Scioscia. Winning in the playoffs requires a bit of luck. If Angels’ fans remember, that 2002 team had to be one of the flukiest. Everyone seemed to catch fire in that lineup at the same time. The Angels have been losing because the hitters can’t stop swinging at bad pitches, and sadly, because Boston is in their heads.